Think i've hit a brick wall...

[SiPMerlin150]

I'm not doing as well as i was now, as a matter of fact i can't even do a fillet weld as good as i could a few week ago.. to tell you the truth i'm spending less time welding for that reason. I must be going out of practise..

I get hard to remove slag and inclusions, and i try to keep the rod at just near vertical to keep the slag at bay, but still happens. I can run beads on the flat not problem at all.

To top that off i've got hot rolled flat steel bar and it wont even tack together thanks to the cruddy layer that wont even want to sand off!

My welder is starting to bug me too.... 4 or 5 rods and it wants its 10 minutes cool off time...

Still waiting for the college to begin to enrol people for the course, and i've kept on phoning them to make sure i'm not put the the back of the list of applicants...

Cheer me up lads!

 

[stuvy]

patients buddy! keeping at it is really the hard part.

Your doing the right things with college and letting it cool, can you not do something whilst its cooling? like a side project maybe?

 

[Wozzaaah]

Can't really cheer you up but keep at it and you'll soon find things falling into place.
Your machine sounds like a pile of poo to be frank, waiting time will seriously frustrate you as all you'll want to be doing is burning rods.

Does it have a cooling fan, what size rods are you using and at roughly what amps?

If you can, start saving for a little DC inverter. You don't need to spend a lot of money on one but the difference will be amazing, they really are a joy to use.
Obviously the machine can't compensate for pilot error, but it will help.

 

[SiPMerlin150]

patients buddy! keeping at it is really the hard part.

Your doing the right things with college and letting it cool, can you not do something whilst its cooling? like a side project maybe?

I don't have any projects going at the moment, i'm kinda boring like that Normally a strong cup of coffee helps me keep my head together, but to have 3 in half an hour is mad!

 

[SiPMerlin150]

Can't really cheer you up but keep at it and you'll soon find things falling into place.
Your machine sounds like a pile of poo to be frank, waiting time will seriously frustrate you as all you'll want to be doing is burning rods.

Does it have a cooling fan, what size rods are you using and at roughly what amps?

If you can, start saving for a little DC inverter. You don't need to spend a lot of money on one but the difference will be amazing, they really are a joy to use.
Obviously the machine can't compensate for pilot error, but it will help.

Its a poo 150 amp buzzbox, 2.5mm rods at 80ish amps im guessing (just has a viewing window with a slide indicator), no cooling fan, though i put in a 120mm cooling fan inside and ran it off an external 12v supply and that helped a tiny bit , like reduced cool off time by 3 or 4 minutes... Was thinking of an inverter unit so i might save for one. I'll keep practising as best i can with it until i can afford one!

 

[PTvor]

Burning a few rods then waiting ten minutes for it to cool, then another couple of rods then another ten minute wait, is just the nature of using a buzz box. Frustrating if you are doing a lot of practice. I'm surprised you got on so well with it so far. Inverters are very much nicer to use and if you get a halfway good one will have a much better duty cycle and fewer problems with rods, e.g. low-hys.

Usually, I've found that steel with thick mill scale will weld, but you need to grind off a clear spot for the earth clamp at least. It's a slovenly way of working. It's far better to grind off the mill scale and rust to bright steel, and you'd always do that for anything serious. if you are having problems you are just adding to them by not grinding back to bright.

What's this talk of sanding? Get an angle grinder and a grinding disc or a flap disc and it will get rid of the mill scale.

You can get 240V box fans which save messing about with a 240 to 12 V power supply and are much more powerful than PC type fans. The one I put in a buzz box came out of an IBM computer years ago. It seems to cut down the cooling time from over ten minutes to about 8 but it doesn't make as much difference as I thought it would.

 

[Wozzaaah]

Even the cheapest of the cheap inverter will be an improvement over a crap buzzbox though you don't get anything simpler than a buzzbox which is why really old ones are still going strong.
Buzzboxes do vary though, I once gave away a 'Solarc' 140A one when I replaced it with a Clarke 190A and wished I hadn't, the Clarke was truly horrible to use.

 

[wyn]

As PTvor says, sanding or wire brushes on mill scale just seem to polish it.
You need to use a grinding disc to get rid of the mill scale.

 

[tombardier]

I don't have any projects going at the moment, i'm kinda boring like that Normally a strong cup of coffee helps me keep my head together, but to have 3 in half an hour is mad!

coffee tends to make my hands a lot shakier. I can really tell the difference! I'm a _big_ coffee drinker too!

 

[SiPMerlin150]

coffee tends to make my hands a lot shakier. I can really tell the difference! I'm a _big_ coffee drinker too!

I am too, love strong coffees, but with milk, i'm no black coffee drinker, except for expresso i find i have thumping headaches after 4 or so hours without a coffee Call me mental but i find i weld better after a few beers!

 

[Norm]

Call me mental but i find i weld better after a few beers!

Probably just looks better love strong black coffee best start to the day mmmm
Norm

 

[SiPMerlin150]

As an update, i used a grinding disc to brighten up the steel bar before commencing with a fillet weld.. i tacked it at one end but the tack didnt hold...2 attempts it took then it finally held...then the rest of the fillet didnt look to good.. again. Interestingly i used another different steel plates and had no problem, i even did a triple pass on it and no problems..

What i did notice is i tacked with a 7018 and it stuck....with a 6013 it didn't...

 

[slimjim]

Even the cheapest of the cheap inverter will be an improvement over a crap buzzbox though you don't get anything simpler than a buzzbox which is why really old ones are still going strong.
Buzzboxes do vary though, I once gave away a 'Solarc' 140A one when I replaced it with a Clarke 190A and wished I hadn't, the Clarke was truly horrible to use.

this is true, I struggle to weld with a buzzbox, but my DC machine makes welding easy, in fact it's easy to weld down to 2mm thickness, using 1.6mm rods

 

[PTvor]

Even the cheapest of the cheap inverter will be an improvement over a crap buzzbox though you don't get anything simpler than a buzzbox which is why really old ones are still going strong.

I think the cheapest inverters weld fine, while they are working. The duty cycles are much better than buzz boxes, but not great, and the makers are vague about the conditions the duty cycle is measured under, which suggests they are trying to get you to assume something without them actually stating it.

The problem with them is reliability.

 

[the snooper]

I think the cheapest inverters weld fine, while they are working.

ive yet to see a welder that welds fine when its not working

 

[SiPMerlin150]

this is true, I struggle to weld with a buzzbox, but my DC machine makes welding easy, in fact it's easy to weld down to 2mm thickness, using 1.6mm rods

AC makes rods stick, i get by fine, but always make a point in striking up a new rod or when restarting, is to preheat the rod so it doesn't stick,

but that doesnt do anything to the pathetic thermal cycle It gets worse once it has hit the thermal cut out, from cold start its around 5 or 6 rods, but after the first thermal cut out, when the transformer is hot, might only get 3 - 4 rods out of it per cycle.

At first i was like, 'hey, its ok, i wont be burning through THAT many rods, as i'm only practising, so if it cuts out for a cool off, its not a problem'.....

.....how wrong was I? At my rate, i'm burning through a 2.5mm 6013 in 20 seconds!

 

[Lawnmowerboy]

my cemont inverter can run 20+ 3.2mm rods without cutting out when i was welding together the dumper bucket for the fergy!!

 

[Tiggy_dorset]

What i did notice is i tacked with a 7018 and it stuck....with a 6013 it didn't...

Be sure that the rods are not, or have not been damp anytime. I used some rods once, seemed dry, but had been damp at some point. Thought the crap welding was me. Took a rod from another box and produced some impressive welds (they were for my standards )

 

[SiPMerlin150]

Be sure that the rods are not, or have not been damp anytime. I used some rods once, seemed dry, but had been damp at some point. Thought the crap welding was me. Took a rod from another box and produced some impressive welds (they were for my standards )

i'll bake my rods, to be safe, they are normally kept indoors, but i will make sure they will be nice and dry. when i meant that the one tack weld i did with the 7018 held the two pieces of steel together no problem, whilst the same two pieces wouldnt really want to tack together with the 6013...

I think its just me being out of practice and having some duff steel...

 

[PTvor]

Usually there are drying instructions with rods. 6013s are something like 110C for no more than 2 hours in an electric oven. If you bake them too hot, you char the cellulose component.

7018s need more like 350C for two hours to get rid of all the moisture but you can get rid of most of it by baking at a lower temperature.

I was given some 6013s of various brands which had been kept in a garage for a long time and some of them had suffered from damp. I baked them in the oven for a couple of hours and they were fine apart from a few Lincolns where the flux was peeling.

I know steel varies in quality even in batches from the same mill, but I've never heard of mild steel that couldn't be welded. Are you sure this was mild steel?